Exactly 10 years ago, I received the Theme & Variations Foundation Awards, as an aspiring young pianist and musician, full of career plans, ambition and excitement. I would daresay that this mindset has not left me in one bit. The only difference is that now I have the joy and pleasure to be doing what I love as my profession, making music, teaching music, passing on my knowledge and views on music to the next and even younger generation. Yet I see myself as very similar to 10 years ago, always excited to learn new repertoire, giving more concerts, and most importantly continue to learn and grow as a musician.
I have the pleasure to be now working as lecturer in Collaborative Piano at the Sydney Conservatorium since 2022, as well as a casual principal pianist at the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. On top of all these, I have given on average 10-15 concerts per year, later this year I will perform a solo recital at the Goulburn Performing Arts Centre for the first time, as well as for Friends of Sydney International Piano Competition a concert in December, among many others. During the past years I have also performed several duo concerts with my wonderful colleague and childhood friend, Rachel Siu, at the Friends of Chopin Canberra and this year at the Phoenix Church in Alexandria, as well as countless performancesrtogether among trios, quartets and quintets at the Sydney Conservatorium faculty concerts. Another musician I have had the pleasure to be working with is violinist, Prof. Ole Böhn, with whom I have played countless duo and chamber concerts at the Sydney Conservatorium as well him bringing me to perform at his home country in Oslo, Norway at the wonderful Oslo Museum.
Since 2024 I have done summer European trips to enrich myself as a musician, doing a course on piano and one on conducting. Last year I went to Teplice, Czech Republic, worked on excerpts from Puccini’s La Boheme and Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin with Maestro Norbert Baxa and the North Czech Philharmonic orchestra, with other talented young singers from all over the world. I am very excited to be going to the exact same place this year to work Dvorak’s Symphonies nos. 7, 8 and 9. Another place close to my heart is Biel/Bienne in Switzerland, where I performed with the Budweis Philharmonic Orchestra twice in 2024 and 2025, the Beethoven Concerto no. 3 and slightly less-played but charming Variations Symphonique for piano and orchestra.
I am forever grateful for the support of the Theme & Variations Foundation gives to young pianists, as the career of this sort is really one in a one thousand, and receiving the right support and the right people matters greatly. I will be giving a special soirée concert in the Theme & Variations Piano Showroom on the 13th June at 7pm, where I had the pleasure of performing here multiple times in my students days for the Foundation and Emerging artists, as well as the enormous generosity Nyree and Ara had in allowing me to record tapes auditions and host special concerts here.
